Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Australian Defence Force

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 01:59, 24 July 2007.

[edit] Australian Defence Force

I am self-nominating this article on Australia's military for featured article consideration. The article has been peer reviewed and assessed as an A-Class article by the Military History WikiProject. --Nick Dowling 01:08, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

• Support But, Image:ADF Deployments June 2007.PNG needs a caption explaining the color codes. someone got that. BenB4 09:25, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support. A well-written and organized article. Cla68 03:44, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose until properly copy-edited throughout (1a). Here are examples.
  • "single service establishments"—hyphenate the first two words. Same for "active duty personnel".
    • Fixed
  • "Century"—why upper-case C?
    • Why not? Anyway, fixed
  • "about 51,000"—MOS says don't say "about". (Criterion 2)
    • Fixed
• The lead is inadequate (2a).
  • "It is the largest military in Oceania"—Oh come now, is that worthy of inclusion in the lead? Larger than the Tuvalu defence force, sure. Makes it sound so parochial.
    • Good point, fixed. It's significant enough to be retained though as this makes the ADF the region's police force/bully-boy (take your pick)
  • "Plays a significant role in operations around the world"—I challenge that on the basis of POV (1c)
    • Fair enough.
  • The second para of "Legal standing" has a number of prose issues.
    • Such as? - I've fiddled with the wording
  • Why "ADF" and then fully spelt out, at the top of successive sections?
    • This is a deliberate attempt to avoid acronym over-load, which is always a problem in articles on the military. Always using 'ADF' looks ugly and 'Force'/'the Force'/'the military' aren't accepted usages in Australia. I've also tried to use 'the Australian military' to seperate the pre-ADF era.
  • As elsewhere, ungainly repetition: "The Australian Defence Force's priorities are set out and explained in the 2000 Defence White Paper. This document was developed by the Australian Government to guide all aspects of Australian defence policy." There's no need for "Australian" x 3. One is enough here. Then "priorities" x 2. Needs a proper audit for such reps.
    • Fair enough. I would note, however, that some repetition of 'Australian Government' is unavoidable as this is the name commonly used in Australia to distinguish the Federal Government from the other levels of government.

The line-up shot under "Current structure" looks as though it's a spoof. Tony 14:49, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• It's a bit odd, but it's the only portrait which was released to the media the latest appointments were made and nothing else is available elsewhere. From photos released to the media, the executive area of Defence headquarters is painted that horrible colour they're standing in front of. --Nick Dowling 23:48, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• Oh no, please don't write "bully boy" or "police force"—POV. It will come up against local sensitivities, and we don't want to be accused of US-style ignorance of local cultures, do we? (Look at the party in Iraq.)
• After the first occurrence of "Australian government", what else would "the government" refer to? The Tasmanian government? I'd use "the government" some of the time, at least.
  • OK, point taken - I was definetly wrong. I've dropped the 'Australian' except where it is necessary (for example, to specify which government funds the ADF and which government approved a new US facility in West Australia)
• What's ugly about "ADF"? The ADF itself uses it liberally. Acronym overload? (It's an initialism, not an acronym.) They're mighty useful, and avoid clutter and ungainly repetition of whole phrases.
  • It's already used enough in the article, at least in my opinion. I spend my days looking at acronyms, so I am a bit phobic to the things though.
• "Century" is not part of a title. Read MOS.
• "In practice, the Governor General does not play a part in the ADF's command structure and the elected Australian Government controls the ADF. The Minister for Defence and several subordinate ministers exercise this control." --> "In practice, the Governor General plays no part in the ADF's command structure: the ADF is controlled by the elected Australian Government, mostly through the Minister for Defence and several subordinate ministers, although ...".
  • This could just be my personal preference, but I think that short sentances work better than long ones. I've tried to keep the prose in the active tense where ever possible as well - with a lot of help from User:Alant.
• The prose throughout needs more intensive treatment than this. Tony 04:16, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
  • I think that it reads about as well as most FAs - though I'm obviously biased! --Nick Dowling 08:50, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support with a few fairly minor suggestions below. Cheers for a great article, Ian Rose 09:33, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
  • "Subsidiary and subsequent legislation handles these matters". Whilst "subsidiary" and "subsequent" obviously mean different things I think "Subsequent legislation" is sufficient.
    • Fixed
  • In the infobox under "Current form", "(ADF established)" seems redundant.
    • I added it to explain what the change was to people browsing the article (I assume that the infobox will be the first thing people read). I don't think that it's well understood that the ADF is a fairly new organisation so this needed an upfront explanation.
  • Linked date fragments, e.g. years in the infobox, tend to be discouraged.
    • Fixed
  • Tenix Pty Ltd#Tenix_Defence currently redirects to Tenix#Tenix_Defence
    • Well spotted! Fixed
  • If this is to be FA I would delink forward defence until an article is written, simply for neatness.
    • Good point - fixed
  • Under Command Arrangements, for "The CDF commands the ADF under the direction of the Minister of Defence and is notionally equal with the Secretary of Defence", I'd suggest "notionally the equal of" if you don't want to put "equal to" (which is generally preferred to "equal with").
    • Fixed
  • Prefer to say that White "has criticised the ADF's senior command structure" instead of "has a criticism of".
    • Fixed
  • Recommend "day-to-day management" instead of "day to day".
    • Fixed
  • In third para of Command Arrangements, don't know if you want to go into a bit more detail by mentioning the Maritime Commander, Land Commander and Air Commander, and their (2-star) ranks, as heads of Fleet Headquarters, Land Command and Air Command - may be a bit fussy.
    • I don't think that that's necessary - I think that it's obvious that these military commands would each have a commander, and if the article included all the 2 star positions in the ADF it would have to be expanded considerably.
  • Under Defence Expenditure and Procurement, a typo: "Australia's GDP is larger than those of it's neigbours".
    • Fixed
  • Under Current Bases, "The RAAF also maintains a network of bases in northern Australia to support operations to Australia's north", you can include a link to network of bases.
    • The sentance covers RAAF Darwin and Townsville which are operational bases as well as the three bare bases which are only occasionally activated. The bare bases are linked in the next sentance.
• "The Australian Army Aviation Corps is equipped with 104 helicopters..."

The Australian Army Aviation article says that "the word corps does not appear in their name or on their badge". Which article is correct? Hawkeye7 09:36, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

• • It's Australian Army Aviation - it seems to be the corps that dare not speak its name! Fixed. --Nick Dowling 00:41, 14 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support. The article has good structure, eloquent grammar and meticulous referencing. Alant 05:47, 14 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support. Very good article. I have no objections. Avala 16:18, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
• Support. Deserves FA status.Buckshot06 19:58, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.